There are a lot of things, like civil defense and firefighting and road building, that historically started working more reliably when they became government-run instead of depending on volunteers or private industry. What makes charity different?
This is why government is best left to handle things that cannot be adequately done without a central command, like keeping the military forces, or collecting taxes. It can also step in where private or public efforts fail, but don't expect it to be as efficient.
I think that's the big difference with things like defense at scale. You don't need war to be cheap, or to optimize dead enemies per dollar; you just need a guarantee that if someone attacks you anywhere and in any manner, there will always be some sort of armed force to defend you. Central command is nice but not necessary. Same with roads; central command is certainly unnecessary, but having reliable nationwide roads is better for a society than intermittent roads where they're profitable.
Do you believe that govermment-run charity will be less reliable than the status quo; that is, do you believe it will help less people? Why?
(I'm not asking about whether it's moral, just whether it works.)
The expense is not always monetary. While US clinics ask exorbitant amounts of money, clinics in certain countries with universal healthcare ask for large amounts of time. You need a surgery? Please wait 4-6 months. (E.g. https://expathealth.org/healthcare-news/global-patient-wait-...)
and? I never said capitalism didn't require any guardrails. Stop straw-manning other people.
> The US is wealthy because it extracted it's wealth from the suffering of others worldwide.
Why is Japan wealthy? South Korea? European countries? Is this the social justice theory of economics? There's not much evidence for that theory. It's pretty clear that capitalism (with appropriate guardrails and the rule of law) is wildly more successful than its alternatives. I think you're trying to argue that capitalism is beside the point and it's war and oppression that creates wealth. That's obviously nonsense.
The US has spent trillions of dollars over the years trying to convince everyone that socialism can't work by making sure it doesn't work. It seems absolutely unscientific to ignore that.
In any case, I am not asking about the abolition of private property, just about government-mandated charity at scale. Let's say you get a marginal tax of 100% on salaries over $200K, and on wealth over $10M. That's more private property than most Americans will ever have in their life. Is tbat proven to fail? Where and how?
Except for Leninism and it's descendents, where has socialism of any kind been tried and failed?
